No Reason to Play It Safe Now That She Is Out of Game

Baseball season opens Monday, but you won’t find Pam Postema crouched behind home plate or yelling, “Play Ball!” at any stadium during 1992.

Postema umpired 13 years in the minor leagues before she was released after the 1989 season. Today she lives in San Clemente and drives a truck for an express mail company.

Postema crossed paths with many of today’s major league stars when they still in the minors.

And Postema calls them the way she saw them in her new book, “You’ve Got to Have Blls to Make It In This League,” written with Gene Wojciechowski.

On Rob Dibble: “He’s one of the biggest jerks in the game. He argued, almost begged, for strikes, which wouldn’t be so bad if he had actually thrown a few once in a while. He was wild. And dangerous, too. Dibble would throw at his own mother for a dime.”

On Orel Hershiser: “I had him in triple A and he was an angel. It was sickening. I truly believe that if Hershiser threw three (strikes down the middle) and you called them balls, he would politely say, ‘Oh where were they?’ He was unbelievable. He never argued. Never. That’s one guy I had a soft spot for.”

On catchers: “Catchers are always trying to be an umpire’s pal. They’re usually two-faced brown-nosers who think that if they buddy up to you enough, maybe you’ll cut them a break. Let me tell you something: catchers will stab you in the back almost as quick as pitchers.”

Trivia time: Who was the last pitcher to throw 300 innings in a season?

Good fit : Mike Littwin of the Baltimore Sun says Eddie Murray and the recently silent New York Mets are a perfect match.

“Here’s a guy who has spent his whole career as if he’s auditioning for the lead in ‘The Marcel Marceau Story,’ and he ends up on a team where no one talks.”

Appetite for the game: As youth baseball leagues begin play, it brings to mind some advice Doug Rader once passed along to former Houston Astro teammate Jim Bouton during a television interview. Rader said kids should eat baseball cards to develop their skills.

“They should eat the bubblegum, the cards, first base, the mound--things of that nature,” Rader said. “But bad statistics can’t be properly digested. So they should only eat the cards of the good players.”

Gimme a $: Esquire magazine reports that Pepperdine is one of 10 universities that offer cheerleading scholarships. Others are American University, Auburn, Clemson, Kent, Montana State, Alabama, Hawaii, Mississippi and South Carolina.

Point well taken: Rookie Stacey Augmon of the Atlanta Hawks wasn’t exactly turning somersaults after he s cored the 6-millionth point in NBA history.

“It means something to me, but it will probably mean more after my career,” said Augmon, who had 866 career points at the time, about .01443% of the 6 million.

Look a little higher: Rumors that a shoulder injury would prevent his joining the U.S. volleyball team at the end of the Italian pro season are unfounded, Steve Timmons told Volleyball Monthly.

“The only pain I’ve experienced is the headache that’s resulted by this information.”

Dining tip: Susan O’Malley, president of the Washington Bullets, on forward John Williams, who ate himself into a suspension.

“He is a very nice person with unbelievable, God-given talent,” O’Malley told Lacy J. Banks of the Chicago Sun-Times. “But he and his waiter are keeping him from his job.”

Training table: A.D. Livingston of Field & Stream magazine reports that cricket fighting is a sport that goes back at least 1,000 years in China and features some unusual training techniques.

“Several days before the fight, the trainer allows mosquitoes to bite him on the arm. When full of blood, the mosquitoes are caught and fed to the crickets in the belief that the trainer’s strength will be transferred to the cricket.

“In addition to mosquitoes, the crickets are fed a special diet of rice, fresh cucumbers, boiled chestnuts, lettuce and various seeds.”

Trivia answer: Steve Carlton pitched 304 innings in 1980 when he compiled 24-9 record and 2.34 earned-run average.

Quotebook: Gene Sarazen, 90, on being tired of his role as one of the Masters’ honorary starters: “I told (Masters chairman) Hord Hardin I was getting too old to play, but he kept saying, ‘Gene, they don’t want to see you play; they just want to see if you’re still alive.’ ”